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Vacation: An Eve Addicts Survival Guide

While on vacation for a week I decided to write a post. I can't help myself. I do miss Eve. My vacation, for those who wonder why I had to give up Eve for a solid week, was a cruise. I occasionaly had internet access on my phone at ports but nothing that would let me log into the game and get a breath full of space flight.

I'm addicted and I'm not embarassed or upset about it. As I said to someone else, my hobby is as valid as anyone elses. People on the ship are sitting at the EA Sports bar watching games and gambling nonstop. I'm laid out on my balcony, soaking up the sun in a bikini and reading some guides for Eve and getting to know my Aura app some more. My money is in my pocket and I'm not screaming at a television full of millionares in spandex chasing each other around.

I can't help but feel that I win a bit in that situation.

So how did I surivive?

First, I have an amazing laptop. I picked up an Alienware M14X. It is a 14 inch gaming laptop. This means I can play eve at the hotel and the airport.

Second, I put my charaters on long training skills. These skills are a pain when you are playing every day but a gift when you are on vacation. Eve releaves you of the need to go out and level. Soemtimes when I am running missions and killing things, I have to remind myself that I'm doing missions to earn money and items (items to keep and items to sell) but I'm not earning experience and leveling in the classic senses that I am used to. Training happens regardless. Making sure that the skills training will take longer to complete then I will be out of contact with a computer helps. It is also a great way to get long skills out of the way without the temptation of starting something else.

Next: I downloaded some guides and read over them. I've commented on ISK the Guide as well. I also picked up another one called the Eve Guide that is older. Eve is a complex game. It is enjoyable but it is also fustrating becuse there are a lot of things that are not explained to you.

An example: Guns. You put guns on your ship. Guns are broken up into many types. There are projection turrets, and hybrid turrets, and lasers and missiles. The ship you choose to fly has what I call, likes. It may have bonuses to hybrid turrets or missiles. This makes picking the type of gun to equip your ship with easy.

What is not obvious is that you should not mix and match your guns. Having 7 different guns with 7 different ranges and ammo is not the most productive way to kill things. Yet, it seems like a fantastic solution. So much death and agony will be unleashed in seven styles! I mean, I often equip two different types of weapon for different damage types. But no. Nope. Bad idea. Inefficient way to fight. Newbie/Noob that you are! How can you miss something not obvious like that?

Could someoe share that? Argh! Hence the guides. Nice people obsessed with Eve take their time to explain simple basic things that are not obvious. The information blurb on equipment and items oftens sucks. SUCKS. Sure, there are so many pieces of stuff in the game its silly. But, but but but but, when the person coding the game builds the item can't they take the time to write a paragraph about it and maybe add things like, "You can not use this on your own ship" or "These items function best when combined with like items".

Bitch, bitch, bitch.

I also have my Aura app. Aura is an application avaliable on the android market. I have my two charaters loaded into the app and when I have a connection it updates me on what is going on with them.

If you have played Eve you may have heard mention of your API keys. Your API keys are an offline charater gateway. There are several levels of API key and the level dictates the access the key has. Corporations use these keys to verify that you are what you say you are. They can also be used to look at your contacts, eve-mail and other charater-personal details. Some corporations will not let you join without this access. Considering Eve's reputation for lies and backstabbing politics, I'm not surprise.

However, it is also useful for things like EveMon and Aura. The API key gives me access to my own things. I can use it to plot and plan. It access everytihng from my charater's skill list to my charater's wallet.

This way, when I sold one of the ships that I had put up for sale before I left, I could see the nice fattening of my wallet with ISK when the app updated. It also shows my transaction logs so I could see that a ship and an expensive skillbook I had put up for sale both sold.

The API does not give anyone account access. They also can not do anything to your charater. It is a view screen of details. Some of the details are highly personal depending on how you feel about them.

Again, someone could say its sad that I'm so addicted, but I'm happily addicted to my game. Why is it okay for someone to watch television for 4 to 6 hours a day and me not play my game, interact with other players, and enjoy myself becasue its a game?

Anyway, I spent some time exploring the app and found all sorts of useful things. For example, it has a skill training option that tells me what skills I *can* train. This is very nice. I may not want to learn the skills it is suggesting to me any time soon. However, I might not have known I could learn that skill without a good bit of effort. Skill books are not accessable everywhere on the market. I often use the market to see what is there and what I can train. This makes it a lot easier to plan what skill book to buy next to inject into my little space people.

I'd clap my hands and squeel but I'm too busy typing.

So, from me, these are a few things that I did to get by and keep my Eve cravings low.

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